No. 21: Mac and Cheese at Ecco

You'd think a mac and cheese would be simple to pull off for a restaurant kitchen, but you'd be wrong. Never mind the technical difficulties of making a cheese sauce creamy-smooth, balancing the flavor profiles and so on, we're talking about the challenge of meeting the expectations of your lizard brain that grew up eating mac and cheese as a child. Were you a Kraft kind of mac-and-cheese kid, or did nana make hers from scratch with besciamella?

So chefs have to temper their desires to drop their skills on the most inviolable childhood favorites. Some of the best results of that chefly tension? The fontina, gorgonzola, and pancetta mac and cheese from Costa Mesa's Ecco restaurant.
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The ear-shaped orechiette pasta scoops and holds the smooth, creamy sauce made with the easy-melting thickness of fontina cheese and the sharp tang of a gorgonzola blue cheese. Mated with the salty, mildly sweet umami of a cured pancetta, this ranks as one of the best adult mac and cheeses in the county.